Monday Reading

 

As always, please go to the links for the full articles/ op eds.

Michaelangelo Signorile writes about the "Biden boom, GOP bust", how the Republican- wired media continues to be caught wrong- footed, and how Democrats must campaign:

The economy is booming. There is no denying it. The media has had a chokehold on this story, pushing a narrative that was untrue and driven by the GOP. With the news today, the president and Democrats should smash through the media’s narrative once and for all — and condemn the coverage if need be.

Republicans are hellbent on attacking the economy and those attacks just can’t stand. They run from talking about anything regarding January 6th. Democrats have to throw it in their faces, and focus on the complete and total crack up of their party, which has allowed extremists to take control.

Hitting on those two issues — Biden boom and GOP bust — will help Democrats keep the House and Senate this November, hopefully expanding the Senate and getting past obstructionists. That will ensure continued progress for the American people. And it will push back the authoritarian assault on democracy. 

Ex-evangelical Chrissy Stroop has a thoughtful read on secularism in the U.S., it's diversity, and how the media (yes, they keep popping up) gets the causes of asymmetric social and political polarization wrong:

... Nonreligious Americans are generally a pro-social bunch, and overwhelmingly in favor of the very rights the anti-social, anti-democratic Christian Right is actively working to take away, like voting rights, reproductive rights, and LGBTQ rights. Yet, according to the legacy media’s punditocracy, America’s rapid secularization is something we should all be terrified of. 

Starting from the demonstrably false assumption that religion is essentially the only source of social cohesion, philanthropy, and pro-social behavior, prominent pundits and religion journalists (who should know much better) continually insinuate that secularization is somehow destroying the fabric of American civil society, and that the nonreligious are somehow to blame for American polarization. How, exactly, is unclear, and it could hardly be otherwise, given that both of these premises are entirely without factual basis.

Think pieces—and often even supposedly “straight” reporting—tend to ignore the empirically demonstrated fact that the social and political polarization that pervades these not-so-United States is asymmetric and significantly worse on the political Right. Not coincidentally, that side of the proverbial aisle consists largely of the conservative, mostly white Christians from whom the newly nonreligious are fleeing. These same conservative Christians, directly encouraged by their defeated president and a host of powerful Republican leaders, attempted to overturn the legitimate results of the 2020 presidential election by means that included a violent Christian nationalist insurrection in which people were injured and killed, very nearly destroying what was left of American democracy, such as it is. But, you know, there are problems with liberals and progressives too, so…

An example of how the radical "Christian" right is extending its disruptive political reach comes via the anti- vax truckers protest in Canada (where 90% of truckers are vaccinated):

After being denied several million dollars raised on GoFundMe, organizers of a trucker-led protest disrupting life in Canada’s capital have found a new platform: a Christian crowdfunding site where they raised more than $3.5 million in two days to demonstrate against the country’s vaccine mandate.

The new fundraiser hosted by GiveSendGo, which describes itself as the “#1 free Christian crowdfunding site,” reported Sunday that the “Freedom Convoy” campaign had raised several million dollars two days after GoFundMe announced that it was freezing more than $8 million in donations to the cause, a move that led Republican officials in the United States to announce investigations.

The rapid influxes of donations have prompted questions about the origin of the funds and sparked concerns among analysts about the use of the online platforms for financing fringe organizations that could allow the interference of foreign entities.

The convoy began as a protest to U.S. and Canadian rules requiring that cross-border truckers be fully vaccinated to enter either country, and it turned into a movement against many public health measures. The demonstrations have drawn praise from Republican leaders in the United States and left residents on edge — with police saying some have been subject to racist vitriol.

"Freedom convoy" my ass.  They're a bunch of loudmouthed, far- right, violent knuckle- draggers.

It's hard to exaggerate just how big a mistake Virginia voters made in electing Trumpist weasel Glenn Youngkin governor.  In office less than a month, he's tried to eliminate mask mandates in schools, vaccine mandates for Virginia colleges, wants to limit abortion access,  promoted laws banning teaching of certain subjects that (white) children might find "disturbing," and set up a snitch line for people to turn in teachers.  His "Team Youngkin" campaign staff prefers going after children rather than protecting them, however:

Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s campaign lashed out at a high school student as well as Democrat Ralph Northam on Twitter this weekend, tweeting out the teen’s name and photo after the boy shared a news story about part of the Executive Mansion where enslaved workers once lived.

On Saturday afternoon, Ethan Lynne, 17, retweeted a report from the Richmond public radio station VPM suggesting that Youngkin (R) might be scrapping efforts pursued under two previous governors, Northam and Democrat Terry McAuliffe, to highlight the history of enslaved people at the mansion. The report contained an error, which Lynne noted on Twitter hours later, when VPM issued a correction.

But by then, “Team Youngkin” — the official Twitter account for Youngkin’s campaign — had attacked Lynne, posting a photo of the teen with Northam taken at a Democratic fundraiser in October.

“Here’s a picture of Ethan with a man that had a Blackface/KKK photo in his yearbook,” Team Youngkin tweeted a little before 5 p.m., pairing the October photo with a racist picture from Northam’s 1984 medical school yearbook that surfaced in 2019.

No matter how bad a campaign the Democrats ran, or the issues they ran on or ignored, you only had to scratch Youngkin's surface to see a typical hypocritical, ambitious, base- pandering Republican who was going to do everything he promised to do once in office. Only a state senate controlled by Democrats stands in his way.

The Washington Post editorial board addresses the seditious, off- the- rails censure resolution by the rotted- out Republican National Committee:

The Republican Party on Friday took an official stand — against truth and democracy. At the Republican National Committee’s winter meeting in Salt Lake City, party leaders censured Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) and moved to aid her primary opponent, Harriet Hageman, who is former president Donald Trump’s preferred candidate for Wyoming’s lone congressional seat.

The Orwellian censure resolution accuses Ms. Cheney and fellow GOP dissident Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) of engaging in behavior “destructive to the institution of the U.S. House of Representatives, the Republican Party and our republic.” Her transgression? Co-leading the House committee investigating the Capitol invasion, an act of political violence Mr. Trump inspired when he was a sitting president charged with protecting the nation from enemies foreign and domestic. The investigation, the censure resolution claimed, is “a Democrat-led persecution of ordinary citizens engaged in legitimate political discourse.”  [snip]

Republicans have started their election year by revealing what they really stand for. Voters must remember this moment in November.

Will they?  See also Signorile, above.

As usual, Infidel 753 has assembled a kaleidoscopic link round-up covering all manner of topics.  We recommend a visit, and also check out his essays while you're in his neighborhood.

Monday Reading (UPDATED)

 

As always, please go to the links for the full articles/ op eds.

Should there be any doubt whose incompetence has led to the vaccine shortage we're experiencing now, read this report from Stat:

Top Trump officials actively lobbied Congress to deny state governments any extra funding for the Covid-19 vaccine rollout last fall — despite frantic warnings from state officials that they didn’t have the money they needed to ramp up a massive vaccination operation.

The push, described to STAT by congressional aides in both parties and openly acknowledged by one of the Trump officials, came from multiple high-ranking Trump health officials in repeated meetings with legislators.

Without the extra money, states spent last October and November rationing the small pot of federal dollars they had been given. And when vaccines began shipping in December, states seemed woefully underprepared.

The previously unreported lobbying efforts underscore that even after the Trump administration spent billions helping drug makers develop Covid-19 vaccines, it not only dismissed states’ concerns about the help they would need to roll them out, but actively undermined their efforts to press Congress to get the funding they needed.

Much of the lobbying push came from Paul Mango, the former deputy chief of staff for policy at the Department of Health and Human Services. He argued, repeatedly, that states hadn’t demonstrated they needed additional funding because, at least as of last October, they hadn’t spent the $200 million that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention sent to states in September.

There's much more at the link worth reading.  Not getting your shots?  Thanks, Trump!

According to a Wall Street Journal report, the January 6 "Stop the Steal" rally that was the immediate catalyst for the Capitol insurrection had financial backing from one thug familiar to most and a sugar momma (WSJ paywall, so this is part of a Vox summary):

A Wall Street Journal investigation has found a number of key allies of former President Donald Trump — including far-right media personality Alex Jones and Julie Jenkins Fancelli, heir to the Publix supermarket fortune — helped to fund the rally that preceded the storming of the US Capitol on January 6 that left five dead.

According to reporters Shalini Ramachandran, Alexandra Berzon, and Rebecca Ballhaus, Jones pledged $50,000 of his own money to the event, and organized additional funds, including a $300,000 contribution from Jenkins Fancelli, who is a major GOP donor.

All told, the rally cost about $500,000, according to the report. That event, during which Trump pledged to never concede the November election to President Joe Biden — and whipped up supporters who later took over the Capitol — formed the basis of Trump’s second impeachment in the House of Representatives. In part due to comments he made at that rally, Trump has been charged with “incitement of insurrection,” and will soon face a trial in the Senate.

The Journal also reports that, according to Federal Election Commission records, “at least five former Trump campaign staffers” were involved in the logistics of the event. The rally was particularly lucrative for Trump fundraising official Caroline Wren, who was paid $730,000 throughout the 2020 election cycle for her and her firm to work on fundraising for the Trump reelection campaign team, according to the Journal. 

But there was another critical fascist faction laying the groundwork for the insurrection, as Sarah Posner points out:

Coverage of the Capitol insurrection has focused on such far-right instigators as the White supremacist Proud Boys and the Three Percenters, a militia group. But a reconstruction of the weeks leading up Jan. 6 shows how a Christian-right group formed to “stop the steal” worked to foment a bellicose Christian narrative in defense of Trump’s coup attempt and justify a holy war against an illegitimate state. In late November, two federal workers, Arina Grossu – who had previously worked for the Christian-right advocacy group Family Research Council – and Rob Weaver, formed a new Christian right group, the Jericho March. The new group’s goal, according to a news release announcing its launch, was to “prayerfully protest and call on government officials to cast light on voter fraud, corruption, and suppression of the will of the American people in this election.” In fact, the Jericho March would help lay the groundwork for the insurrection.  (our emphasis)

It's a great read that exposes the role not just the talibangelist hustlers like Paula White and Franklin Graham, but  groups like "Jericho March" that have been under the radar for most casual observers.   Their phony patina of being a "peaceful prayer" movement is only a cover, while their shock troops plan violence to attain their end of one- party, theocratic rule. (Chrissy Stroop has another look at these Christofascists here. And Rachel Mikva, too.)

As State Republican Parties descend into QAnon quackery and ramped- up voter suppression initiatives, the stakes for our democracy will hinge on passage of the new Voting Rights Act (H.R. 1) in the Senate. Ron Brownstein explains why this means the filibuster must go:

The party’s immediate political fate in the 2022 and 2024 elections is likely to turn mostly on whether Joe Biden can successfully control the coronavirus outbreak—restarting the economy and returning a sense of normalcy to daily life. But the contours of American politics just over that horizon, through 2030 and beyond, will be determined even more by whether Democrats can establish new national standards for the conduct of elections through a revised Voting Rights Act and sweeping legislation known as H.R. 1, which would set nationwide voting rules, limit “dark money” campaign spending, and ban gerrymandering of congressional districts. With both bills virtually guaranteed to pass the House, as they did in the last Congress, their fate will likely turn on whether Senate Democrats are willing to end the filibuster to approve them over Republican opposition on a simple-majority vote.

That decision carries enormous consequences for the future balance of power between the parties: The number of younger and diverse voters participating in future elections will likely be much greater if these laws pass than if they don’t, especially with state-level Republicans already pushing a new round of laws making it tougher to vote based on Donald Trump’s discredited claims of election fraud in 2020. Given those stakes, the Democrats’ voting-rights agenda is quickly becoming a focal point of the pressure from left-leaning activists to end the filibuster. “Our grass roots will not accept the notion that we had good intentions, but we just failed” to pass these laws, Senator Jeff Merkley of Oregon, a Democrat who is the lead sponsor of the Senate companion to H.R. 1, told me.

We're optimistic Democrats will use their power to counter the anti- democratic actions of the anti- democratic Republican Party -- January 6 changed everything.

A cautionary tale from Myanmar:  when you try to ride the tiger, you often end up inside:

Aung San Suu Kyi defended Myanmar's generals against genocide charges at The Hague. She praised soldiers as they unleashed artillery against ethnic minority settlements. She took only modest steps toward democratic changes that would chip away at the army's political power.

It wasn’t enough.

On Monday, Myanmar’s military seized power in a coup, detaining Suu Kyi, elected ministers from her National League for Democracy (NLD) party and others in a predawn raid. Though condemned internationally for defending the military and its campaign against the Rohingya minority, the Nobel Peace Prize laureate who spent 15 years under house arrest until 2010 now finds herself again at the generals’ mercy.

Now that you've gone through our limited reading selection, do yourself a favor and check out Infidel 753's link round- up for a truly comprehensive selection of worthy posts from around the Internet. His essays are also worth your attention, like this one on the so- called Republican civil war.  Trust us.

UPDATE:  Rather than do excerpts from it, the New York Times basically has an extensive blueprint for impeachment managers to follow in "77 Days:  Trump's Campaign To Subvert The Election" that's a must read.